February 17, 2016

The ranch is 30,000-acre getaway that is home to John B. Poindexter... “I did not pay for the Justice’s trip to Cibolo Creek Ranch,” Poindexter wrote in a brief email Tuesday. “He was an invited guest, along with a friend, just like 35 others.... The Justice was treated no differently by me, as no one was charged for activities, room and board, beverages, etc. That is a 22-year policy.’’... A person familiar with the ranch’s operations said Poindexter hosts such events two or three times a year.... The nature of Poindexter’s relationship with Scalia remained unclear Tuesday.... It is also still not known who else was at the Texas ranch for the weekend....

What about the Italian prominentes who were invited to have dinner with Obama because he was tired of politicians ?

People like Scalia are always invited to things to be decorative or to liven the conversation.

I'm reading Gates' book. He was invited to events like this. He was invited and declined the invitation to the hunting trip that involved Cheney's accidental shooting of the guy who was invited after Gates decline.

Don't y'all know that "comfortable" Texans often invite friends, and interesting folk they'd like to become friends, to their places for some good eating, good hunting, good talking? Down here we call that behavior "hospitality" and it is a good thing.

Has a Clinton never accepted, say, a free trip to the islands for some good clean fun? Or free underage sex slave fun? Well, this sort of thing is like that, but without the underage sex slave fun. Some of us have what are called "standards."

Freeman Hunt - it's both. I assume sometimes he shuts the ranch to paying guests and uses it for himself. But other times the ranch takes in ordinary folk (the kind who pay $600/night, anyway) - it's elaborate version of renting out your vacation home on VRBO.

Coincidences, coincidences. I'd never heard of VRBO until yesterday evening; a friend has to find a house etc for family who'll be in the LA area for a week.

The more pressing question so far as I'm concerned is, will Justice Scalia's Requiem celebrated at the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception on... Sunday, is it? be old rite ('the traditional Latin Mass'), to which he was attached, or new?

Marc Puckett, VRBO is the best, especially for people traveling with kids. We've used it all over - even to find apartments in Rome and Florence - and it has never disappointed. The very best part: you don't have to spend your vacation sleeping in the same room as your children.

Tari at 2:27, Yes, there are three children under the age of seven involved. The family are catching their breath, as it were, on a long trip from Sydney (via Costa Rica) to London.

MayBee at 2:21, "When asked whether Obama's Saturday plans [Scalia's funeral is Saturday, not Sunday as I had mistakenly recalled] include golfing, Earnest stressed instead that the president believes it is important to honor Scalia's life and service." (NBCnews.com)

"Don't y'all know that "comfortable" Texans often invite friends, and interesting folk they'd like to become friends, to their places for some good eating, good hunting, good talking? Down here we call that behavior "hospitality" and it is a good thing."

This is a normal sort of thing for the rich anywhere. Especially if it involves field sports - hunting and shooting. The British aristocracy seem to have spent half their lives visiting each other and hunting each others game. Heck, half at least of Wodehouse's books take place in some country house (i.e., a palace) hosting a bunch of guests.

mikee said..."Don't y'all know that "comfortable" Texans often invite friends, and interesting folk they'd like to become friends, to their places for some good eating, good hunting, good talking? Down here we call that behavior "hospitality" and it is a good thing."

That was my thought. Just the incredible urban parochialism of the WaPo, that there needs to be some explanation for why an avid hunter might go down to Texas to a hunt. If he'd died at fucking Disneyworld with his great-grandchildren, would they wonder what explanation there could possibly be for a man being at Disneyworld? These people have no clue whatsoever how normal Americans spend their lives.

Buying friends? No not really. Everyone there is guaranteed to be at least comfortably well off. Lean and hungry types on the make are generally not welcome. Influencing people - yes. This is the ancient way of it.

Where I come from it is (or was, in the days before impossible traffic) the custom for people in a certain social position to hold open house of an afternoon, most often on Sundays. It was an open invitation for acquaintances, business partners, persons of influence, or anyone to whom a blanket invitation had been extended to drop in, have merienda (teatime) and chat. Lacking hunting venues in the country, the same sort of invitation would be extended for golf, for dropping by the Polo Club as a guest, for the summer house in the mountains, for the beach house.

Very very high at some points, not so bad in the good old days when the government barely existed. Point is, its universal, the tendency to country society, corruption or no.

In the 19th century Britain was effectively ungoverned, or rather unregulated for the most part, hence any tendency to corruption, as in stealing from the public purse, had little to corrupt. Or corruption was a mater of private negotiations of power at venues like this, hidden from public view. It seems to me though that such will always happen and any dislike of such personal dealings is quixotic.

mikee said...Don't y'all know that "comfortable" Texans often invite friends, and interesting folk they'd like to become friends, to their places for some good eating, good hunting, good talking? Down here we call that behavior "hospitality" and it is a good thing.

Yep... Caro wrote about it numerous times in his books on LBJ - I'm sure Althouse knows it as she's mentioned she was reading the books here before. LBJ and Abe Fortas were best buds.(Ironically, Fortas ended up resigning from the Supreme Court after disclosure of a secret $20K/year retainer from the family foundation of a Wall Street financier (the very kind of deal LBJ used as currency for years to get his way in the Senate)

If you want a famous US example of a country retreat of the movers and shakers - The Bohemian Grove -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohemian_Grove

I suggest that this sort of institution no longer exists in its original form, which is a bad thing as the guest list of such places was much broader than the constrained circles of influence among todays elite. This was one of those nonofficial mediating institutions. Granted, the goings on at the Bohemian Grove could get much odder than (I assume) at some Texas hunting lodge.

I have been to what they call the Spring Jinx at the Bohemian Grove; the one session where California non-members can be invited. The major event is for members and out of state guests only. I am not sure it is much changed from when it began. There are camps within the grove, each with their own character and all in different styles ranging from very basic to posh. Some serious lectures, entertaining plays and musicals and much drunkenness. Best as I could tell there was no business being discussed. Just that old horror of men having fun without women.